Name::- Sneha Agravat
Batch:- 2020-22 (MA sem 2)
Paper 10:- History of English Literature from 1900 to 2000
Topic name:- Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party: a Comedy of Menace
Roll no.:-16
Enrollment no.:-3069206420200001
E-mail Id :- snehaagravat2000@gmail.com
Submitted to:- S.B.Gardi Department Of English Maharaja krishnkumarsinhji Bhavngar University
Introduction:-
In this assignment I going to explain the term “ Comedy of menace ” in another words it calls “Dark comedy” In reference of Harold Pinter’s play. “ Birthday Party ”. Harold Pinter has also used “Comedy of menace” in his other plays such as “ The Room ” and “ A Slight Ache “.Harold was used by term “Comedy of menace” and comedy is most important part of the play. The birthday party has been described as Irving Warble as a critic. This play different theme, symbol, character, Absurd all discuss of the Harold view.
What is comedy of meance:-
“Comedy of Menace” means another called in the Play. Comedy of menace is a term used to David Compton, Nigel Dennis or Harold Pinter. It may develop from a feeling of uncertainty and insecurity. This feeling of menace establishes a strong connection between character’s predicament and audience’s personal anxieties. ”The Birthday party” as the comedy of menace and it is a tragedy or comic element.
About play:-
The Birthday Party is an Existentialist play by one of the radical writers Harold Pinter. The play is also categorized under the genre of 'Comedy of Menace.' The play also consists of elements of pinteresque such as Ambiguous Identity, confusions of time and place and also use of deep political symbolism.
Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party is a comedy of menace. The play is actually the mingling of comedy with a perception of danger that pervade the whole play. Stanley, the central protagonist always finds his life beset with danger. Meg is the owner of the boarding house away from the society where Stanley stays temporarily as a tenant. Meg arranges a birthday party in Stanley's honour though Stanley denies it being his birthday. Two gentlemen called Mr. Goldberg and Mr. Mc Cann come to stay in the same boarding house for a couple of nights. Their appearance fills Stanley's mind with unexplained fear and tension. Stanley attempts to disturb the strangers so that they will be forced to go away. The feeling of menace is reinforced when Stanley scares Meg by saying that some people would be coming that very day in a van. They would bring a wheelbarrow with them to take someone away. Eventually no one comes but Mr. Goldberg and Mr. Mc Cann take stanley with them. In fact Goldberg and Mc Cann represents parts of Stanley's own subconscious mind. Nothing is stated or hinted about Goldberg and Mc Cann and about their attitude towards Stanley. At best they seem to be agents of some organisation which has sent them to track down Stanley.
The Birthday Party and Look Back in Anger perfectly reveal the individual and social problems and doubts that great Britain was moving through during the post-war era. Both this two famous plays indicate the spirit of times and become vehicle or instrument for dramatic action.
Influence of comedy of menace in the play:-
Pinter himself explained the situation thus: "more often than not the speech only seems to be funny - the man in question is actually fighting a battle for his life". He also said: Everything is funny until the horror of the human situation rises to the surface! Life is funny because it is based on illusions and self-deceptions, like Stanley’s dream of a world tour as a pianist, because it is built out of pretence.” In fact the play Birthday Party is built around the exchanges of words, which, though funny enough, contain hints that suggest the impending doom lurking around to them. Meg’s situation as a childless old woman who talks through repetitions may seem funny and odd, but those cover up her unconscious desire to have son, a desire she tries to fulfil through the mothering of Stanley and Petey. But Above all, Stanley’s staying in a sea-side lodge, his shabby appearance combined with inconsistent words and memorising may seem strange and invoke mild laughter but in reality he is facing a crisis which he is himself not completely aware of.
Pinter creates an atmosphere of menace through a variety of dramatic elements and techniques. First of all, he lets situations fall from a light-hearted situation unexpectedly down to one which is highly serious. For instance, while talking to Meg among other things, he tells her about a wheel-barrow which will come to the house for some body. Here we get a suggestion of impending death through the sudden reference to coffin. Again, we see Meg offering Staley the gift of a drum as a compliment to his supposed musical talent. But Stanley begins to beat it with such savagery that the audience is left dumb-struck as to the real intention behind this. This kind of abrupt explosion of violence is once again seen when Stanley kicks at McCann. But more importantly, menace is presented through the fears the characters feel but cannot spot. First of all, fear of weather is introduced: the characters repeatedly enquire about weather, and this becomes tangible once the audience understand that the lodge is situated on the coast of a sea. Then Stanley tries to frighten Meg by prophesying the arrival of wheel-barrow which, of course, does not come for her. On the other hand, on hearing the visit of two strangers, Stanley feels a complex fear—first of all, the fear of being driven away from the lodge which has become for him as comfortable as his mother’s womb. A house represents security and comforts from the hazards of the outside world but sadly it is impossible to sustain. Goldberg and McCann is the embodiment of menace from a hostile outside world. We also note that he stays in a lodge, which cannot be a substitute for home. Secondly, Stanley faces the fear of being persecuted by the intruders. That is why he expresses his desire to run away with Lulu, but is afraid of doing so in reality.
With the hosting of the birthday party, the play reaches its climax of menace. A birthday party is expected to be a ritualistic celebration of one’s life, but in the case of Stanley it turns out to be the greatest ordeal of life leading to his complete mental derangement. The audience now understand the menace turning real though in transformed forms. Stanley faces not only physical assault but also a torrent of words, with the serious accusations like "He’s killed his wife" mingled with trivial and ludicrous like "Why do you pick your nose?". The persons who could have saved him are either absent or drunk.
The play ends with Stanley’s forced removal from the house by Goldberg and McCann who leave a further note of unknown menace awaiting Stanley in near future. This uncertain menace is further strengthened by Petey’s inability to communicate to Meg what has exactly happened with Stanley. To conclude, it can be said that the final impression of the play on the audience echoes Pinter’s own words: " In our present-day world, everything is uncertain, there is no fixed point, we are surrounded by the unknown ... There is a kind of horror about and I think that this horror and absurdity (comedy) go together."
The comedy of menace is present in the Birthday paty in the first scene it is a way of gently introducing the audience to thee world which Pinter is try to creat. This homour is quite subtle at first. Peter and Meg about whether Stanley is up or not play on the word up and down:
Meg : ‘Is Stanley up yet ?
Petey : I don’t know, is he ?
Meg : I don’t know. I haven’t seen him down
Petey : Well then, he can’t be up.
Meg : Haven’t you seen him down.
In this above conversation Pinter make a joke with the worry really who is they, although the repitation in this short joke is very minor which made them smile and the humour also lulls them into a sense of confort. A joke with a similar effect is made through another short dialogue between Meg and peter which Meg is asking who is having a infont with peter insisting that she does not know her until finally saying it’s Lady Mary Splatt’, to which Meg replies “I don’t know her.’ During the conversation of Meg and Stanley’s conversation has some comedic value it could also make the audience feel slightly enesays, perhaps will ask thirselves why this women of sixty treats a man thirty like a boy and why he plays along with her at time.
Thus humor while seeming quite light can have a deeper meaning and cover up something a lot more serious about a character and problems there Stanleys attempts at humour when talking to Lulu are a kind are a kind of his social inadequacy. When she said that it’s stuffy he replies ‘stuffy/ I disinfected the place this morning. And when she talks about his gerring under Meg’s feets he said he always on the table she talk about his she seeps the floor. These two lines are both untrue and when Stanley’s aim seems to be make a joke. Secong observation is that, Goldberg does achieve what he wants to with his use of comedy and threats. This is because he want to create a more menacing scene in order to complexly destroy Stanley. His humour comes from the common expressions that he sometimes modifies.
The different registers of these expressions. Pinter used comedy at that moments in the play in order to reassure the audience and to keep some suspence: if the whole length of the play was filled with a menacing atmosphere we would know that Stanley will lose the power struggle from the houmour also brings a certain level of normality bake to the proceeding of the play so that the menacing atmosphere can increase slowly afgain creating more suspense. Stanley Webber is the protagonist of this play he is the only boarder at the Bole’s boaring house and is initially defined by lazyness unkeptness and smuggle cruely toward Meg. The might be a musician might want became a famous. Although there are a sense that he has sins unatoned for it. His aggressive depression transitions into a nervous breakdown when Goldberg and McCann arrive until he is nothing but bumbling like idiot. Goldberg and McCann are new visitors related to Stanley’s past. MartinEsslin gives various possibilities about Stanley’s past. According to Esslin, like Heidegger,Pinter takes as his starting point that fundamental anxiety, which is nothing less than a living being’s basic awareness of non-being, of annihilation. Pinter’s people are in a room, and theyare frightened of what is outside the room. Outside the room is a world peeping upon themwhich is frightening. Esslin also suggests that the root of the menace may be political –Stanley in his past may be belonged to some radical organization or Government or someEstablishment and now he has escaped from that for which the party or Government itself ishaunting for him. Stanley may be an absconder from some fanatic religious organization orhe may have escaped from a mental asylum. Stanley goes on using ‘they’ which can meanthat the concerned persons are unidentified or that Stanley is well-aware of their identity;again it can mean that he must have been associated with them where ‘they’ can stand for anygroup, organization or institution.
Conclusion:-
The Birthday Party is fantastic play by Harold Pinter. It is the best example of ‘Comedy of Menace’. As the definition Pinter has not only conclude here the comedy and make the laughing of audience but he gives the tragedy on his play, the Birthday Party. Stanley’s condition, unexpected guest, Lulu’s rape, The birthday party, birthday Gift etc events make smile and entertainment of the audience but behind the reason of character is different. Like Stanley is real in problem, the owner of house but somehow he was fail to remove these expectedable guest. Lulu’s rape is the secret but Lulu can not told her problem to his families and also her loveable person.Thus some events of the Birthday party are seen as very critical.
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